One of my “pet” peeves is seeing someone in the car with their precious little dog in one arm or the pet standing on the driver’s lap looking out the window. My first thought, even before “What a cute dog”, is “If she gets in an accident that cute little dog could be killed!” I doubt very seriously the little ones ten pounds and under would survive if the air bag deploys. At best they would be hurt in some way by the airbag hitting them.

So I did some research trying to find out how many animals were injured in accidents because the pet wasn’t restrained. I found some astounding information. It turns out that there are thousands of accidents each year that are caused by unrestrained animals. The exact numbers are not known because these are put in with other internal distractions. In the case of pets, the driver gets distracted because the pet gets sick or the pet gets in the way or something else that takes their attention off the road.

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